Susan Visvanathan

Susan Visvanathan (born 1957) is an Indian sociologist, social anthropologist and a fiction writer.

She is well known for her writings on religious dialogue and sociology of religion.

Her first book Christians of Kerala: History, Belief and Ritual among the Yakoba (Oxford University Press) is a pathbreaking work in the field of sociology of religion.

She is a Professor of Sociology and former chairperson at Centre for the Study of Social Systems at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).

Susan Visvanathan studied at Delhi University and Jawaharlal Nehru University.

After finished M.A in Sociology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, she did her M.Phil.

and PhD in sociology at the Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi.

Susan completed her PhD under the supervision of the eminent Sociologist and Social Anthropologist, Veena Das.

Susan started her career as senior lecturer in sociology, Hindu College, University of Delhi in 1983.

She has been an honorary consultant to the World Council of Churches, Geneva 1987–89, consultant to the Oxford University Press, New Delhi 1994 to 1999 and from 2009 onwards and consultant to Freie University, Berlin, 2011.

She was head of the Department of Sociology there from 1989 to 1997.

She was Honorary Fellow, Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla 1990–1995, and Fellow, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi 1989–92.

She joined the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) in 1997, where she is now a professor.

She teaches Sociology of Religion, Historical Anthropology, Classical Social Theory and gender studies.

She was a Charles Wallace Fellow in Social Anthropology to Queen's University Belfast 1997.

She has been a visiting professor to Maison des Sciences de L'Hommes, Paris (2004), Paris 13 University (2011).

She has been guest faculty at Freie University, Berlin and at University of California at Santa Cruz and at San Diego, South Asia Network at Lund University, Sweden and at University of Jamaica at Mona campus.

She was chairperson of the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University from 2010 to 2012.

Literary Critic Bruce King's book Rewriting India:Eight Authors (Oxford University Press, 2014), has a chapter on the literary and fictional writings of Susan Visvanathan.

He writes,"Susan Visvanathan's fiction is purposefully anti-autobiographical and is based on her sociological studies, stories she has been told, other fiction, and what she imagined during her travels. Refraining from formulae of consciously Indian literature, her fiction avoids predictability; and that is part of its message, that life is an unpredictable process of change".

King writes,"The unpredictable quality and structure of Visvanathan's fiction, even its fluctuating tone, is in keeping with her vision and can be attractive. She is an interesting writer".

She was the Research Excellence Fellow at the Central European University (CEU), Budapest (2018-2019).

She also writes fiction during winter and summer breaks from the university, extending sociological and theoretical concerns in the more vivid prose of literary fiction including short stories and novels.